Fabulous Traditional Handmade Candies!!

公開日： 2014/02/13 : 最終更新日：2014/03/07 About Tokyo, English, Japanese Food Asakusa, Cool Japan, japanese art, Japanese culture, Japanese food, japanese souvenirs, Japanese sweets, Japanese tradition, Kawaii, Tokyo, where to go in Tokyo

Today, again, I would like to share an information about a shop in Tokyo.

Very near to Imado jinja shrine (please refer to my past article, “A Fortune Kitty, a cat that you should express more respect for!”), actually just across the street from the shrine.

The name of the shop is アメシン AMESHIN.
The outlook of the shop is so cool and will definitely attract you to step inside.

Inside, you will find a very simple decoration room with very simple tables and chairs. However, on a shelf there arranged neatly gorgeous handmade candies, which are the protagonists of the shop. So the interior should be exactly like this, as simple as possible not to bother the beauty of the candies.

Photographs are from the official website of Ameshin.

The owner chef, I mean the owner & craft master, is Shinri Tezuka, and he opened this shop in September 2013. The shop is quite new but Mr. Tezuka is a young but skilled and comitted entrepreneur, who may feel the sense of mission to protect the Japanese tradition. In addition to the necessity of protection he pursues his professionalism and excellence of making beautiful figures with candy.

When I was a little kid, crafts men of this type of candy were not so rare and every time I went to night stalls of local festivals I like watching a man (usually old man) making various types of beautiful figures with candy by hand instantly.

This is a painting called “Candy man” by Charles Wirgman. I put it just to give you an idea how a traditional candy man was. Please be sure that I don’t belong to this period…

Joking aside, this traditional technique is also on the Red List in Japan. I would like more people to know about this tradition to protect it from becoming extinction.

This type of traditional candy goes surely against the trend of the times; not cheap, not convenient and not of mass-production. But I’m sure this old fashioned candy tells us something important that we must not forget about.

I have to add that in the caffe’ area you can take AME-coffee and AME-tea, for which AME (candy) of gold colour deluted with water is served instead of sugar. Very delicate sweetness!

Moreover, there are trial candy making courses in which Mr. Tezuka teaches you. Once you see this beautiful candies I’m sure you will love them. So please extend your stroll to Imado when you visit Asakusa!

SHOP INFORMATION of AMESHIN

Address: 1-4-3 Imado, Taitou-ku, Tokyo
(10 minutes walk from Asakusa Station)
Opening hours: 11:00 – 18:00
Closed: on Thursdays
Official Website: http://www.ame-shin.com/
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/amezaiku.ameshin